Figures from Eurostat found that 31 per cent of surfers caught a virus or other computer infection in the last three months of 2010, with seven per cent suffering financial loss as a result, despite 88 per cent of victims saying they had security software installed.
The UK was by no means the worst country in Europe with a virus problem, though. The report, released to coincide with Internet Safety Day, found that people living in Bulgaria (58 per cent), Malta (50 per cent) and Slovakia (47 per cent) had the most victims. Austria had the lowest at 14 per cent.
Despite the UK having one of the lowest virus rates, it was one of the countries most attacked by phishing, with seven per cent of surfers having their card fradulently used or being duped into handing over money to scammers.
The survey looked at 200,000 computer users across 27 countries in the European Union.
Attacks on mobile phones rose by 46 per cent in the same period, according to reports by McAfee. However, only 947 viruses were actually detected, which is a relatively small amount considering that 100.9 million smartphones were sold worldwide in the last quarter of 2010.
WEBUSER
Topic: Third of UK surfers victim of PC viruses (Read 2418 times)